World roundup, Oct. 2

October 2, 2012Updated: October 2, 2012 11:12pm

HONG KONG

7 arrested in deadly boat collision

Police on Tuesday arrested seven crew members from two boats that collided in Hong Kong waters, killing 38 holiday revelers, but offered no theory about how the vessels ran into each other in one of the safest waterways in Asia.

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The Monday night crash was Hong Kong's deadliest accident in more than 15 years, and its worst maritime accident in more than 40.

The government said 101 people were hospitalized, 66 were discharged and four had serious or critical injuries.

SYRIA

Journalist from Texas seen in video

An American freelance journalist who has been missing in Syria since mid-August has been shown in a video clip posted online, blindfolded and saying “Oh, Jesus” in a frightened voice in the custody of armed men.

The video, which came to light Monday, was the first sign of Austin Tice's condition since he disappeared more than seven weeks ago. Tice, a former Marine from Houston, had been reporting on Syria's civil war for The Washington Post, McClatchy and others.

GEORGIA

President concedes parliament control

President Mikhail Saakashvili conceded Tuesday that his party had lost Georgia's parliamentary election and his opponent had the right to become prime minister, setting the stage for political turmoil in the final year of his presidency.

The new Georgian government will be led by billionaire businessman and philanthropist Bidzina Ivanishvili, who made his fortune in Russia.

It was the first time in Georgia's post-Soviet history that the government changed by vote rather than revolution.

NIGERIA

At least 25 killed in attack at college

Assailants killed at least 25 people at a college in northeastern Nigeria early Tuesday, police said. But while the Islamist sect Boko Haram has killed hundreds of people in the region over the last year, suspicion this time focused on a campus election that was bitterly contested along religious and ethnic lines.

The attackers “were selective in their operation,” said Godfrey Ameka Okeke, the police commissioner. “They had the names of the victims” they intended to shoot, he said.

FRANCE

Strauss-Kahn rape case dropped

A prosecutor in northern France says officials have dropped a preliminary investigation into allegations of rape in a Washington, D.C., hotel by former International Monetary Fund chief Dominique Strauss-Kahn.

State prosecutor Frederic Fevre in the northern city of Lille said Tuesday that the supposed victim, an escort girl, went back on her original account and now says no rape was involved, the Sipa news agency reported.

AUSTRALIA

Study shows loss of Great Barrier coral

The Great Barrier Reef has lost more than half its coral cover since 1985, according to a new study published Monday. The loss has been spurred by factors including hurricanes, coral-eating starfish and coral bleaching.

The paper in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences is the most comprehensive survey of a reef system over such a long period. Researchers from the Australian Institute of Marine Science found that reef cover fell from 28 percent to 13.8 percent over the past 27 years, with two-thirds of the decline occurring since 1998.